


Smoke Screens

by wilyasha



Series: Firewall [16]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Gen, Psychosis, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-29
Updated: 2018-01-29
Packaged: 2019-03-11 07:29:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13519407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wilyasha/pseuds/wilyasha
Summary: A couple of outtakes fromAd Astra.





	1. Scry

**Author's Note:**

> I had a few outtakes from _Ad Astra_ , that ended up getting snipped from the story just because I didn’t like where they would have been placed and it kind of broke up the flow, but I still wanted to share them. They’re more like scenes rather than concrete chapters, hence the length. I love Haggar, Thace, and Kolivan so I wanted more scenes with them (including angst and banter) … but they just didn’t make the final cut.

Summary: Takes place around chapters eight and nine, after Haggar tortures Larka and before the siege on Gal. Haggar struggles with her unraveling identity.

~*~

Haggar’s arms are like weights, dragging low against her body. Suffocating her as she gazes in the mirror, miserable and unfortunate. She feels ill, smothered beneath that girl’s words.

_Mother. Mother. Mother._

The temple is cold tonight. A chill sets into her bones.

 _“You should eat, Honerva.”_ She can’t make out the voice, even as it travels through the centuries. _“The children asked about you, Honerva. What should I tell them?”_

She’d rather starve herself than share a meal with those children. She doesn’t want to stare into this mirror, brimming with poison. Haggar swallows around the rage and vehemence. She’d rather pump boiling quintessence into her own body. Intravenous. 

“Whose children?” Haggar asks, aloud. Her own voice grates on her nerves.

Whoever spoke to her before does not answer her now. The temple aboard the dreadnought swallows her whole, chewing and digesting whatever is left of her bones and thin flesh. She hates these rooms with their cathedral ceilings and octagonal walls. 

_“A new laboratory for you, Honerva. Anything for you.”_

Haggar grits her teeth as she slides her slender fingers across her cheeks, through white hair, against graying purple skin. This doesn’t feel right. There’s the weight of a child on her lap, a small boy with an eager grin on his face. A teenaged girl, on the cusp of adulthood, glaring at her. The bulk of a man twice her size pressing a kiss against her cheek, down her neck, over her shoulder. 

_Mother. Mother. Honerva._

Haggar’s teeth chatter, her palms clammy as she thirsts for something. 

“No water. No food. The rift. Open the rift. Wider,” she murmurs. The words tumble out and she desperately slaps a palm over her lips. Shaking her head, her legs tremble beneath the weight of her body. 

“High Priestess?”

Haggar straightens her stance, cocking her head to the side and raising her chin, appraising the figure once more in the mirror. This isn’t her… only a part. She searches her memory, slowly shaking her head. She is the strongest druid within the Galra Empire. She can figure this out, she can pluck the worn memory from her mind. She can’t hide it from herself. She’s tortured lesser beings for information more crucial than this. 

“Perhaps I don’t want to remember,” Haggar says, louder than before.

“High Priestess?”

 _“Honerva.”_

She swears she can remember Alfor’s face, pale blue markings, the facial hair she ached to shave off in his sleep. He had tried so hard to emulate their father with his goofy grin and friendly disposition.

_“Brothers are so stupid, Mama.”_

“Yes, they are,” she grits her teeth at the cloudy memory of Alfor and Altea. 

“High Priestess, you are needed on the bridge.”

“What?” Haggar snarls, turning around to face the druid that dared to disturb her.

Even with the shroud pulled high, she can feel the hesitation roll off him in heated waves.

“You are needed on the bridge,” he says, “there seems to be an emergency on Gal.”

The mirror disappears in black wisps at the swipe of her hand. 

“What sort of an emergency?” she asks, turning to leave the temple. The druid trails after her and it takes all her willpower not to strangle him and everyone aboard the bridge.

“There seems to be an exodus occurring,” the druid explains. “They are under attack.”


	2. Secrecy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Takes place at the end of chapter fourteen, after Coran tells the story of the original paladins. Thace reminisces on the moments after Keith’s birth and his decision to leave him on Earth. He wishes to tell Team Voltron the deal he made with a druid named Malax. Kolivan deters him.

Thace now understands how Larka felt. Away from him for so long, their son on some foreign planet systems away. How did she cope, with the small family they had created, being separated so quickly? Did she mourn in private? 

It has been a long time since he thought about Malax, about the corrupt Alteans, about the secrets he and Kolivan had to keep between each other. To protect his son. It was always to protect his son. Kythel. The Blue Lion. The druids on Earth, ready to infiltrate. 

And now, not one but two of the children of the corrupt Alteans work alongside him and his allies. 

He does trust them. He must trust them. 

“You’re thinking too hard about this,” Kolivan says, arms crossed over his chest, appraising his friend.

Thace sighs, sitting up in his seat, ready to brush off whatever lecture Kolivan is going to create out of thin air.

“I can hear you thinking across the building,” the Blade leader continues.

Thace rolls his eyes, ready to get up and leave. His wife and son are missing in action. He doesn’t want to hear this. He feels useless. Perhaps spending so many years at Central Command has now made him stir crazy. He’s desperate for field work out in the open. 

“We should tell them,” Thace finally says, irritation bleeding into his tone. “They should know everything. The Blades, Voltron, the rebels. We’re all fighting the same war.”

“Absolutely not,” Kolivan says, immediately. “We’re working towards the same goals, yes, I agree. But the only reason we’ve survived this long is by not doling out every piece of information we’ve discovered over the centuries.”

“I bargained with my son’s safety by turning a blind eye to what those druids were doing,” Thace hisses, teeth clenched tightly. “I lied to my wife to keep fellow Blades out of Malax’s line of sight. You and I made a deal with that corruption after my son’s birth. Now we have crucial information that ties much of this intel together, and you don’t want to share it?” Thace is standing by the end of his tirade, frustration making his forehead sweat. 

Kolivan clenches his fists, looking away, and Thace prods on.

“Lotor is after a Teludav. He most likely needs other scientists alongside him, there is no way he can get that far without support. The logical answer is that those druids -- Malax and Pidge’s father -- are working with him. Perhaps for their personal gain, perhaps they really support what Lotor is doing. But Voltron has a right to know that the Galaxy Garrison is indeed corrupted by those druids and Larka needs to know that they were also watching over Kythel.”

Kolivan takes a deep breath, chuffing in aggravation. 

“You and Ulaz never listen to my rulings, do you?”

Thace cracks a smile. 

“Fine,” Kolivan says. “We’ll tell them, but after we get Larka and your boy back, and _only_ when they’ve settled!”

“Thank you,” Thace lets out a breath he’d been holding in since Coran began his tale vargas ago.

“And I will be the one to explain this to Larka,” Kolivan murmurs. “You, out of everyone, should know how she gets when she’s slighted.”

“Cantankerous? Moody? Throws herself into her work?” Thace supplies.

Kolivan lets out a small chuckle. “All of the above.”


End file.
